Ethiopia rejects Banyana's request

15:18, July 23, 2011

The South African Football Association's request for a postponement of Banyana Banyana's second leg 2012 London Olympic qualifying match against Ethiopia in Addis Ababa on September 11 has been rejected by their opponents who are insisting that the game should go ahead as fixture by the Confederation of African Football.

When CAF and Fifa drew the fixture list of the 2012 London Olympic Games, Banyana Banyana were paired with Ethiopia in the final first leg qualifier in South Africa on August 28 and the second leg match penciled in for Addis Ababa on the weekend of September 11.

The other semifinal sees Nigeria playing against Cameroon on the same weekends and the winners in the two-legged qualifiers qualify for the London Olympics. However, that was before Banyana also qualified for the All Africa Games that get underway in Maputo on September 3-18.

The All Africa Games sees Banyana opening their program against Zimbabwe on September 5. They then play Tanzania on September 8 and round off their group phase of the tournament against Ghana on September 11, the same day that they are also supposed to face Ethiopia in the second leg Olympic Games qualifier in Addis Ababa.

"We wrote a letter to CAF notifying them of the clash in fixtures as our second leg Olympic fixture clashed with our final All Africa Games group match against Ghana," said Nomsa Mahlangu, the chairperson of women football and Safa National Executive member.

"However, we have just received a response from CAF informing us that they notified the Ethiopian federation about our predicament, but that our request has been turned down and the Ethiopians are insisting that the games should go ahead as scheduled.